Learning as procrastination

So yesterday I had this crazy thought. Learning is my go to place to procrastinate.

As I’m trying to build products I realize how litle I know on various subjects. Sometimes is not even limited knowledge, it’s really having no clue.

So I go from subject to subject in the hopes of acquiring basic knowledge. I’ll look for books, blogs, courses, tutorials and so on. The learning starts. Then something funny happens as I start learning. I understand how the big subject breaks down into different sub topics and look for ways to get basic knowledge in each. This creates a never ending circle as any subject can be broken down into smaller parts.

Take Design. Seems fairly simple for an outsider. But first you need to chose an area of Design. Desgin as in branding, landing page or application design. Let’s choose user interface design. You can break down into so many areas: user goals, business goals, visual hierarchy, information architecture, typography, color, layout, elements (there’s a lot more). And you can keep breaking down each sub topic.

You get the picture. The learning possibilities are endless.

There’s a big problem I’m seeing with seeking all this knowledge. Finding how limited skills are creates a sort of inaction. I learn from the experts and expect my work to be somewhat similar. As that doesn’t happen it seems that whatever I create is not enough to put out in the world. So I need more learning. Uff.

“Better knowledge does not make you more influential, powerful, and successful unless you apply it.”. This article reflects a lot on this. Learning and procrastination.

Stop learning by consuming. Start learning by creating.

Amy and Alex over at Stacking the bricks have been a great source of inspiration. They even wrote a book on shipping. Just f*cking ship

Learning is crucial but not for the sake of it. I can’t seek expertise in everything if what I need is to be a generalist.